Shadowstrike
by BillyDeeWilliams
Summary: An exile has fallen in with Commander Farsight and has become one of his most effective stealth team leaders. During a raid on an Ultramarines world, Farsight recovers a database containing a terrible secret and mobilizes the Enclaves to answer the threat to the Tau Empire. Shadowstrike and his team quickly find themselves locked in an impossible struggle for survival and victory.


This is my first attempt at writing a 40k fic. I'm sure it's not nearly grimdark enough, but considering it's about the Tau, such is more acceptable than it might be if I were writing about the Guard or Astartes. The main character is a Tau stealth team leader, Shadowstrike, an exile from the Tau Empire serving in the Farsight Enclaves against the Ultramarines. The overarching plot of the story concerns the discovery a Blackstone Fortress in the vicinity of Ultramar and the Tau Empire, which various factions will obviously vie for (I'm not sure which factions, but, aside from the Tau and the Ultramarines, it will almost certainly include the Guard, the Orks, and the Necrons, and maybe Eldar and/or Chaos Space Marines, considering Abbadon's interest in the Fortresses). Please read and review, as feedback of any kind is essential in my quest to one day actually become a good writer of fiction. Except for Shadowstrike, I likely won't be providing the full Tau language names of the various characters, since even creating his name was exhausting.

Obviously, the great majority of this belongs to Games Workshop, but most of the major characters are or will be original creations.

Also, I'm fairly easily bored and have trouble concentrating on one project, so I can't promise any kind of schedule in updating this fic or that it will end in any meaningful way. However, I was inspired by Tiberium Wars and its fun codex entries at the end of chapters, and so plan to add similar sections to the end of this chapter and future chapters (considering that I'm only into 40k for the fluff in the first place). Obviously, the quality of that fluff is likely to be dubious, so take it with a grain of salt (or sugar, as the case may be).

* * *

The officer was holding his breath. _Damn_, he thought. _Why do I keep doing that? They can't hear me breathe in here_, he scolded himself, releasing the held breath. He supposed, having a few seconds to reflect, that it was just part of his ritual. Every soldier he'd known had one, something they reflexively did before battle. Given his role, his ritual seemed particularly apt. Inside his battlesuit, he tapped a few keys, checking the mechanism that unsheathed and powered up the power blade stored along the suit's forearm. Obediently, the triangular blade extended three feet out, above the suit's closed right fist, a sheath of disruptive energy encasing it. He looked at the blade, and the massive sea-change it represented in his military career, and wondered for the thousandth time if he had done the right thing.

He banished the thoughts as irrelevant to his current mission, and performed a few diagnostics on the enormously powerful fusion blaster that had replaced his suit's left hand. The miniature star inside awoke, feeding power into the weapon's capacitor chamber, causing it to glow with a bright blue light. As with his breath holding, he reflexively looked around, making sure no one had somehow seen through the complex active chameleonic camouflage the suit employed. After all, he was deep behind enemy lines, and about as far from any support substantial enough to extract them should things go wrong as it was possible to be. With only a single hunter cadre, the mission he and his men had volunteered for was very nearly suicidal, but he was heartened by the presence of nigh-on the greatest hero his people had ever had the privilege to produce, second only to his legendary teacher, Puretide. Farsight had never lost a battle, and Shadowstrike doubted he intended to start now.

Shas'vre Fal'shia Re'O'ran Ka'erra, known to his fellow hunters as Shadowstrike, was jolted out of this longer reverie by the crackling of his entanglement comm: "Vre'Ka'erra. Report," a clipped, but famous voice said.

"All systems nominal on battlesuits one through six, commander. Waiting only for your word."

"You have it, Captain. Make the Empire proud."

"Yes, sir," Shadowstrike said, switching back to the squad channel, saying, "Shas'ui: move out; Brightflame, take your section."

"Aye, Captain," the veteran stealth soldier replied. The other Shas'ui serving in Shadowstrike's stealth team said nothing, their complete discipline and utter comprehension of their mission requiring no further instruction.

Their Blacksun Filters providing them with a clear view of the compound that was their objective, the two sections rapidly bounded towards the base's fortified perimeter, surveying its defenses. Their quick survey revealed only four of the so-called auspexes, devices the semi-humans used to detect soldiers like Shadowstrike and Brightflame. _Unfortunately for them_, Shadowstrike thought, _the technology is so antiquated it can't even reliably detect us_. The six suits cut in with a burst from their jump jets, easily vaulting the fifty-meter walls and its blue-and-white banners, causing this compound to stick out like an ugly wart on the face of the otherwise barren plain. Having landed on opposite sides of the base, they proceeded to their primary objectives. At that point, their deception would be revealed, and they would have to hope that Farsight and his Crisis and Hammerhead aces could reach the outpost before he and his men were slaughtered. Within his suit, Shadowstrike shrugged; _Such is the way of war_.

"In position, Captain," came Brightflame's voice, looking down on the squat command bunker from his vantage point atop one of the base's air defense towers.

"As are we. Fire at will," Shadowstrike replied, charging his fusion blaster inside one of the humans' garages, across from the base's main power generators. A moment later, six overcharged fusion blasters discharged at once, sending vastly powerful bolts of plasma scorching into the two most vital buildings in the small base. Brightflame's fire gutted the bunker, killing the commanding Ultramar Auxilia colonel and most of his staff, while Shadowstrike's assault on the power plant caused several secondary explosions, taking one of the barracks buildings with it, killing several hundred Auxilia troops.

As one, Brightflame's men extended their powerblades, and destroyed the anti-aircraft gun they hung from before it could target them. They quickly dropped to the base's floor, to get beneath the firing arcs of the powerful automatic turrets.

Shadowstrike and his men spun on their heels, recharging their blasters to fire into the garage, destroying many of the base's armored vehicles with low-power, rapid-fire fusion blasts, and destroying the rest with their blades while their blasters hissed and popped from overheating.

At the command corner of the base, chaos reigned as Brightflame's still-nearly-invisible hunters laid into the rallying Auxilia with their powerblades, and blasting harder targets with full-power fusion blasts. Several Auxilia, rallied by an intrepid officer, formed into a ragged platoon, and began pouring lasfire into the general direction of Brightflame's section. Instead of using their jumpjets to escape, as they would have in the regular Tau Empire armed forces, Brightflame's men used the jets to charge the growing platoon, smashing into them bodily, and sending them flying. Brightflame, his adaptive camouflage failing from several lasgun hits, loomed suddenly over the officer, and hacked down with his blade, eviscerating the man in a spray of gore, firing several low-power blasts from his fusion blaster into the scattering platoon as he did so.

At the mouth of the garage, things were going less well for Shadowstrike. Neither he nor Farsight had counted on the base having an actual Astartes presence, but, nevertheless, about ten of them were present, and they had rallied several hundred Auxilia and had ambushed them as they attempted to leave the gutted garage. A bolter shell had already killed one of his Shas'ui, and Shadowstrike was having to retreat ever-farther into the deathtrap of a garage to avoid the seeking marines, each of whom led a group of about thirty Auxilia. Shadowstrike was, however, not without his craft. He had placed an infrared markerlight at the end of a corridor ending in a blind corner, which two of the Astartes and their Auxilia were forced to come down. Using the markerlight's information, Shadowstrike sent his remaining Shas'ui bolting around the corner, his jets at full blast, slamming into the enemy, sending them scattering. He fired several bursts from his blaster into the clumped Auxilia, roasting them in their carapace armor, while using his powerblade to bisect one of the Astartes, who had been aiming the bolter at the Shas.

Just as the Shas impacted the clump, Shadowstrike came blurring out of the corner, using his jets to launch himself through the narrow gap between the ceiling and the fighting Shas; he impacted the end of the corridor rather painfully, and blindly let go the overcharged fusion blast he had been storing into the machine shop that adjoined the corridor, where three more marines and about a hundred Aux were waiting in support of the two that his Shas had engaged. The blast took an Astartes full in the chest, and exploded, killing another marine and dozens of Aux. With his remaining Shas in a desperate struggle with a surviving marine in the corridor behind him, he had no time to follow up against the survivors of the blast, instead hopping back down the corridor, powerblade extended.

He got there just too late. The Astartes was better equipped for this kind of combat; at this range, discharging the fusion blaster would kill the Fire Warrior, reducing the Shas to swatting at the Astartes' bolter with the blunt end of the blaster, as he pushed his blade closer and closer to the Astartes' chest, resisted by the marine's powerful arm, which had the Shas's right forearm in a death grip. Just as Shadowstrike reactivated his jet, the marine managed to get his bolter into position, and blasted the Shas's knee and lower leg into a bloody mess with three .75 caliber shells, and put two more into the Shas's faceplate.

It was, however, also too late for the Astartes. Nearly blinded by rage, Shadowstrike put the full force of his jets behind his spearing attack, and before the Astartes could turn, Shadowstrike's blade impaled him, and the force of Shadowstrike's impact shattered the marine's ceramite armor, and he continued, blasting through the marine by main force, leaving him little more than a red mist and some armor chunks, coating the exhausted captain in several gallons of gore and damaging his battlesuit.

Limping into the spare parts storage room at the blind cornered-end of the corridor, where he and the Shas had originally lain in ambush, Shadowstrike pointed his blaster at the door, waiting for the inevitable counterattack. It never came. He wondered why, and realized Farsight had been hailing him for the last three minutes, and he was hearing the sounds of heavy fighting outside.

On the approach to the base, Commander Farsight and his heavily-armored, highly-mobile force had already reduced the walls of the base to powder, and his XV8s and 9s were scything through the disorganized defenders with flamer and burst cannon, while Hammerhead Gunships pounded targets of opportunity from extreme range with railgun fire, when he finally got a response from Shadowstrike. "Commander," the captain coughed, "My apologies for the lack of response. I was otherwise engaged."

"So I see. You have done very well. Brightflame and his men are safe, with some minor injuries, if you haven't had time to contact them."

"Thank you, Commander. I had not. Unfortunately, I lost both of my Shas'ui; I failed to account for the possibility that this base would boast actual Astartes, and my men paid."

"I failed in the same, Captain. It's my command, it's my fault."

"Maybe."

Farsight sighed, briefly lamenting the compassionate soldier. They had the greatest potential, but also a fragility that most of his people's enemies lacked. But there would be time for such musings later, Farsight reminded himself, and simply said, "I will have a medical team at your location shortly, Shadowstrike."

"Thank you, Commander," Shadowstrike said weakly, and passed out.

When he awoke, aboard a renegade Kor'vattra cruiser on its way back to the Farsight Enclaves with the hunter cadre crammed into every available space, an invitation to Farsight's staff meeting, already in progress, was waiting for him. After a short ride on the ship's internal maglev system, Shadowstrike found himself in the ship's large main briefing room, where Farsight interrupted his narration of the events of the raid to welcome him, saying, "Ah, Captain Shadowstrike. Glad to see you're awake. You're just in time to hear what exactly it was that we got from the Astartes base."

Shadowstrike found a seat, muttering an apology, and waited. "The raid was a complete success. Only eight dead, and six more wounded. More to the point, we extracted out objective."

"Yes, the monstrosity that you excavated, and which is now taking up a huge amount of space in my hold, not to mention the power and network resources its antiquated technology is consuming," Highrock, the cruiser's captain, said testily.

"While I certainly apologize for the inconvenience," Farsight said, a slight mocking smile on his face, "what we have found makes it very much worth it. The database we extracted, a backup of a similar database the Ultramarines chapter of the human Adeptus Astartes have on their homeworld, did not contain the information we sought, but it contained information even more valuable, that my analysts doubt the humans are even aware of. As most of you probably know, the humans have been fighting a great war with the forces of Chaos in the galactic west. Their enemy, and, likely, ours one day, apparently employed several huge and ancient weapons to cause untold destruction. The Astartes library contains several scattered references to a device matching the description of those used in the west. I plan to acquire this weapon."

"Acquire it? Can we even make use of it? And won't going after it simply alert the humans, and possibly the forces of Chaos, to the fact of its existence, assuming they don't know about it?" Highrock asked, more interested now.

"We may not be able to use it any meaningful fashion, but that does not matter. We know that the devices' power increased astronomically when more are used. Two were enough to destroy a planet; three made a star go nova. Even if we cannot use it, we must keep ensure it is not used against the Empire. We believe that the humans, lacking our analytical AIs, have not collated this data, and have no knowledge that another of these weapons is in the vicinity. However, as Captain Shadowstrike's recent experiences show, we cannot afford to assume anything. Therefore, going forward, we will assume that the humans know as much about this device as we do. That being the case, they will surely attempt to stop us, and to acquire the device for themselves."

"If they knew about it, why have they not used it?"

"We believe the humans do not know how to make use of the weapons' higher functionalities, and probably did not even know of their true power before their current struggle. From data sources captured during the First Great War with the human Imperium, when the humans possessed these weapons, they used them merely as large and powerful space stations. Given that our data suggests that the weapon is buried deep within the crust of a dead planet, they may have regarded it as too much trouble to obtain. Assuming, of course, that they are even aware of it."

"Can the Enclaves achieve this objective with its own resources?" Colonel Sunspear, Farsight's chief of staff, asked from one end of the conference table.

"We must. There will be no help from the Empire on this. We can't trust the Ethereals with it. Indeed, the more I think about it, the more I believe it will be necessary to destroy it, if we can."

"But think of the power!" Highrock exclaimed. "The Empire is but a tiny speck compared to humans, the Orks, or the Tyranids. With it, we could ensure the Empire's security."

"I am as tempted as you are, Highrock. But the risk is great, likely greater than we now know. And, given our people's lack of many of the talents our enemies possess, I think it highly unlikely that we can make use of its potency. And destroying it is the only way to be sure it can't be used against the Empire."

"You must at least consider saving it."

"I consider all options, at all times, Captain."


End file.
